1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system for creating and interacting with computer-generated visualizations of information databanks in all four dimensions of time and space. In particular, the invention relates to a system and method to transform information datasets into four-dimensional (3D space plus time, hereafter known as 4D) objects, and visually and temporally browse and analyze the complex, dynamic relationships between 4D objects and their attributes in the combined temporal-spatial domain.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the field of computer graphics, computer-based 3D imaging systems are known. Computer graphics languages and application-programming interfaces exist that interactively display 3D-perspective drawings of visual scenes onto the 2D pixel matrix of computer monitors and other computer-interfaced image projection devices. The most widely used computer graphics language used to achieve this is OpenGL™, which can generate 3D interactive visual scenes using 3D-accelerated PC-based graphics cards or special purpose graphics machines such as Silicon Graphics(R) workstations. Users can interactively manipulate the spatial location and orientation of the perspective eyepoint via a user interface device such as a mouse, joystick or trackball, to effectively create the effect of flying thru the computer-generated 3D visual scene, as well as select and highlight various 3D objects in the visual scene.
Web browser based 3D imaging is also known. World-wide-web browsers have been enabled with 3D graphics languages such as Virtual Reality Modeling Language (VRML) and Java3D™ that display platform-independent 3D images and scenes in a web browser.
In the field of computer-based database management systems, temporal data mining is also a known technique. Information databanks have become so huge and complex that data mining techniques have been developed using the SQL data query language to find and extract the desired information, which is presented to the user in a tabular text format, or possibly summarized in a chart or graph. Present day relational databases also support time fields, which enable data mining to be done for specific points in time. These database reports, charts and graphs fail to capture and readily present the nature of complex temporal data relationships. Analyzing data as snapshots-in-time also inherently excludes the complex dynamics of temporal data relationships.
CAD models are the most common form of computer-generated 3D visuals, which have also been visualized as color-coded models representative of the specific construction sequence of each visual CAD model component. Attempts at visual time sequencing that exist in the prior art are limited to a temporal selection of a subset of CAD models and their color attributes. The technique used to achieve this in the prior art uses a temporal table lookup that produces a snapshot-in-time visual result without maintaining any temporal context, which limits the custom applications to these scheduling spreadsheet type of datasets.
However, none of the prior art discloses a system capable of extracting from any information databank the complex temporal data relationships that change over time, so as to interactively present to the user a 4D visual representation of that dynamically changing data over time, maintaining both spatial and temporal context. Such a system is necessary to provide a natural user interface in all four dimensions (that is, the four dimensions being time plus each of the three spatial dimensions), to facilitate deriving knowledge from a higher level of understanding of the complex temporal data relationships embedded deep within and across large information databanks.
It is thus desirable to have a four-dimensional (4D) data browser, integrating a fully user-controlled time dimension with an interactive 3D visual scene, to produce a computer-based environment to create, view and analyze a multitude of 4D objects representative of the dynamic, complex temporal data relationships in large information databanks. With such a system to quickly, easily and naturally perform four-dimensional data analysis, it is possible to transform information databanks into a decision support knowledge base for the many processes in both the private and public sectors that rely on an understanding of dynamically changing data relationships.